Printing and apparatus therefor



NOV. 28, 1933. w KEMMLER ET AL 1,937,087

PRINTING AND APPARATUS THEREFOR Filed 001;. 27. 1952 2 Sheets-Sheet l INVENTOR JAMES 14/. KEN/7L5? l V/LL/AM 6. WE L ATTOR Y 1933- Y J. w. KEMMLER ET AL PRINTING AND APPARATUS THEREFOR Fiied Oct. 27. 1952 2 Sheets-Sheet 2 H m /Tm wkw n NW. A 5% M Patented Nov. 28, 1933 k I;

' PRIN'HNG APPARATUS I THEREFOR James "w. Keminlerland William o.,weig1e, Philadelphia, Pa., assignors to sl'oan'e Blabon Corporation, Philadelphia, Pa., "a 'corp'orationof Delaware 'Appneatibnoettter,21,1932. serial N6. 639,716. I

This invention relates to a method of producf ing decorative coatings by combinedprinting and blasting, and to apparatus by which such: v a

are not'tobe taken'asin anyse'nse limiting 'or coating may be produced;

Since ourinvention is particularly adapted for a the production of printed-coatings'on' felt base floor coverings and other similar materials," it

will be particularly described herein in connection It is, how-- with the manufacture of suchgoods. ever, not limited to' the decoration'of any particular type of object, but is capable of" muchwider application. 1 t

Y In the manufacture of printed floor coverings, the base sheet has been printed with designs by means of sawed wooden blocks. "Eachof these blocks carries a raised area corresponding to one color portion of the design, and this raised pertion is sawed along lines spaced approximately of an inch apart, so that the suriac'e is divided into narrow projections.- A paintbucket'with'a roller which dips into the paint passed under the print block after each printing operation and after the roller has contacted with the raised portions of the print block, a dropiof'the paint is left suspended on each of the projections formed 'between the sawed cuts. In the case of line blocks, these drops will be in the form of'longbroad lines of paint, whereas in the case of pin blocks, the saw cuts aremade crossing one another, so that the drops will be approximately hemispherical, and about of an inch indiam When the material has been moved into printing position, and the paint pot moved away from the printing" block, the block is dippedto eter.

'the surface of the sheet where the drops of paint 'are transferred from thebucke't'to the sheet. Since the drop of paint from each line or pin of the block is. separately applied to thelsheetfit frequently happens that'the paint, after the printing operation, isnot-in a smooth film, but is in the form of distinct lines or dots which do not always close in and flow together 'satis' faLc torily.

h It is an object of the present invention to provide a novel method of brushing out the paint which has been applied by printing: in the usual ing out; a i a In the accompanying drawings wet-havegillustrated vone apparatuslembodying our invention, and certain modifications thereof which are well' adapted to carry .a out theprocess of our inven- 7 tion; These are chosenas illustrative of the in?" vention'and for the purpose of assisting in the explanation of its operation and principle, and

restrictive. A v H t I Fig.1 isjshowna side elevation partly in section and partly broken away, of a printing machine with-which 'is associateda rotary brushing device=embodying our inventio'n.-

In Fig.- 2; is 'abottom' plan view'of one of the 6 5;: I rotary heads of the" device shown in Fig.'1.-

Fig. 3' is a planview showing the arrangement of the rotary heads relative to the printed sheet.

Fig. '4 isanend elevation ofanotherform of brushing-out mechanism embodying our inventio'ny r a Fig, '5is' a vertical section taken on' line, 5'-&

Fig. 6 is'abottom plan view, partly in section,

of'the device illustrated in Figs, l and -5,"wit-h 753.-

the slide -jet removed; i

Fig; 7'is aplan view of-the bottom of this a'p p'aratus with the. slide jet'in positiom- Fig.8 is a plan View of another form of apparatusyandf a Fig. 9'is a cross section taken on line 9 ,-9"of" 1 3 7 The apparatus illustrated in Figs. 1 to'3 'comprises a rotary brushing head, or series of brushing heads, associated with a printing machine- 5 which may be ofstandard construction. The brushing-heads 10 in this case'are hollowfcasings having a narrow slit opening or openings or jets 11 on their lower faces, These jets 11' rotate very close to,'fbut never'touching the suria ce of the paint or otherprint material which has been appliedto thesheet' or otherobject passed be-- neaththem. TIheiI'qn ui'nber and arrangement; I

although shown as preferred, :may be varied.

They may, for example; be curved or at an angle to the radius, and'in some cases a parallel opening -may be i Fig. 2; p

The brushingheads' 10 are supported close to the printed sheet by means of a-framework 12, in 0 cured to the sleeve 14; serves to rotate the brush preferred to the form illustrated in a In Fig. 3, the relation of the various heads to the width of the printed sheet is illustrated. As

there shown, it is desirable that several heads.

should overlap slightly,.so that no partof the sheet which is passed beneath them will escape the action of the brushing heads.

In Fig. 1 we have shown the brushing device broken away from the rest of the printing ma \Wardand forward over the stencil plate. Ordinarily, however, it will be better to hold the jet chine to indicate that the exact relation to the printing heads is not essential. Tosome extent,

this relationship should depend upon'the effect which it is desired to produce. Thus, if the brushing is to be effected by means of a gentle air blast which will serve only to flatten out the ridges of the printed coatingmaterial sufficiently to insure their leveling and closing in, the brushing device may follow immediately after the last printing head, or may be substituted fora print ing head at an earlierposition of the machineif it should be desired to brush out only a pa t of the coating which is to be applied. Ordinarily, however, I prefer to position the device sufliciently beyond the last printing head so that there may be a substantial amount'ofslack between that printinghead and the brushing device, so that the material may be drawn continuously beneath 'gagement with thein terior of the casing 21 thebrushing heads, andthe problem of arranging the heads to produce a uniform brushing effect upon sections successively brought beneath the heads may be avoided.

In the operationof the device as just described, the. sheet, e. g,, of felt base material 20 is passed through the printing machine and the designs printed thereby by the successive printing'heads,

compressed air from the pipe 13. Under ordinary conditions, when a simple leveling effect is desired, the pressure supplied to these heads need not exceed two or three pounds above atmos: pheric. With higher pressures, various intermingling and veining or splashing effects may be obtained, as hereinafter described. 7

The effect which is to be obtained may also be varied by. varying the speed of rotation of they brushing heads 10. For example, a slowrotation may permit the paint or other coating material to flow ahead of the sheet jet produced by theslit opening l1, and may thus tend to intermingle adjacent portions of the coating material, and toproduce a blending or streakingout of the portions between areas to which different colors have been applied; whereas, with faster-rotation, the blast from the jet may pass each portion of the coating material before it has had an oppor-.

tunity to flow very far from its original position, and the leveling effect may thus be produced with less tendency to blend or streak. In thecase of marbleized patterns, the streaking of course is desirable, and in certain other designs, a blending and softeningof the borders is highly desirable.

In Figs. 5 to 7, we have illustrated another device embodying our invention. Y the brushing consists of a casing 21, to, the bottom of which is secureda stencil 22 and a sliding plate 23'having therein a narrow slot 24. The stencil and sliding plate assembly are: held in position by means of clamping plates 25 and the stencil 22 is held against sliding by its en-v In this case,

Sealing strips 26 of rubber, felt or other suitable material are preferably. provided around the stencil openings so as to prevent escape of air between the slotted plate 23 and the stencil plate 22. Air is supplied to the casing .21 through opening 24 away from the stencil plate during the movement 'ofthe sheet 20 beneath the brushing head, and this may be accomplished, for example, by driving the screw shaft 30 from the main. drive shaft 31" of the printing machine.

In the present instance I have shown the brushing device as replacing one of the printing heads on the machine, ordinarily the-last, andhave shown the drive for the screw shaft 30 asbeing taken from the cam shaft 32 through a gear.

box 33. Wherethe drive is to be'intermittent, as described above, thegear box 33 advantageously includes a mutilatedpiniom or a Geneva gear,

or other intermittent drive'mechanism, and the tended primarily for use with designs inwhich it. is desired to avoid thebrushingout of. certain,

portions of the design. For-example, where the blasting'is to be carried. on so, as to effect a splashing or streaking ofthe colors .to simulate a marble effect in a tile pattern, itwillbede sirable to avoid the crossing of the borders of each tile, and it may therefore be necessary to effect the blasting of adjacent tiles inseparate operations. Or in case where marbleized tiles are .to beseparated by tiles ;of :solid color, the blasting ,under conditions to produce streaking obviously should'not be permitted to carry the streaking effect beyond .the borders of the marbleized tile sections. I This limiting of the blasting effect is controlled in'the present case, by means of a stencil block 22 and the sealing,

strips 26. When the slide 23 is moved beneath the stencil 22, its slit 24 passes across the open .ings of the stencihand, in so far as it coincides with those openings, a blast of air willbe'allowed to escape, but inv so farias itrcoincides with the closed portionsofthe stencil, no blast will escape through the slit 24. Thus, as the slit passes from edge to edge across the stenciLthe designrareas corresponding to the openings in the stencil will be blasted, whereas the areas corresponding to' the closed portions of'the stencil will be protected from the air blast.

As already suggested above, it may be desirable I to provideseveral successive headsof this type,

each with a -'different stencil-,so that different as tov produce variedv effects upon the'dilferentf shown, and in such case the direction of stfeatking may be varied, and in some cases, also, it may be-desirable to move the slide longitudinal 15s or diagonal, instead ly of the sheet 20, rather than crosswise, so as to produce a longitudinal streaking. In some cases,

also, it may be desirable to utilize several'slots 24.. Some of these maybe positioned at angular or curved relation to others. I v I In Figs. 8 and 9, we show still another embodiment of the invention. In this case, the blast of air is delivered from a pipe 40 through rotating tubes 41 having slots 42. In the preferred embodiment, these slots are, as shown in Fig. 8',

spiral, but it will be understood that they may be straight and parallel to the axis, or angular, or in any desired shape; or a plurality of short slots or drilled holes at different positions and/or at different angles to the axis and radius may be used instead of slots as shown. The spiral form has a tendency to produce a more or less diagonal sweep of the air blast, whereas a straight slot parallel to the axis would produce a sweep longitudinal of the printed sheet. By mounting rotating tubes .1 longitudinally of the sheet, instead of crosswise, a perpendicular sweep blast of air may be obtained, or by decreasing the pitch of the spiral, the movement of the blast may be made to take effect in a more nearly transverse direction. The choice of the particular direction and form of the slot 42 will thus be determined by the effect which it is desired to produce by brushing the printed coating with the air blast.

adjacent colors.

Although the present invention may be useful for the treatment of any heavy coating,--that is, a coating of sufiicient thickness to flow laterally, it will be found of particular advantage, where it is desired to produce designs with greater or less irregularities in repetition, as is the case where it is desired to simulate by mechanical printing designs which are formed by processes of nature, or by hand. 'Where a simple blending action is intended, we prefer to use cut-out printing, thus producing a sharply outlined design in which the colorextends entirely through the coating, and to subject this to a blast which is moved with sufficient rapidity so that the coating material must lag behind and cannot pile up and be carried ahead of the blast.

On the other hand, where sharp, irregular effects are desired, as in the case of imitations of marble, etc., it may be more desirable to print the simulai tion of the design by overlay printing, and in some cases, even with the use of colors'which tend to. flood. In this case, also, it will often be desirable to use a slower moving blast, or one with greater force, so that there will be a tendency to movev substantial amounts of the coating material of one color out into the materialof another color, and in some cases, instead of a moving blast,

it may be desirable to subject the coating suc- ,ces sively to intermittent blasts impinging there on from different directions. Thus, the force. of the blast may be regulated in amount, in direction, in continuity, and in movement or change of direction, and accordingto the regulation'of the force in this manner, numerous different effects may be obtained as desired. It is to be understood that the particular apparatus and methods described above are chosen for illustration and explanation of our invention, and that the invention is in no sense limited thereto, but on the contrary, that numerous other changes and modifications may be made within the sc0pe, ,without departing from the spirit of our invention. 7

What we claim is: Q 1. In a block printing machine, the combina I tion of means for printing a heavy coat of print material onto the surface of the objectlbeing' printed, means for'moving the object being printed into and away'from printing position, and means for blasting with a compressed gas the surface of the print material while still fluid.

2..An apparatus for printing designs whichcomprises means for printing relatively heavy 'coats of print materials onto predetermined areas of an object being printed, means for moving the. object, a movable air nozzle adapted to deliver a blast of air against the print material on said object and means for moving said noz 10 5 zle so as to blast successively all portions of a, predetermined area thereon.

3. An apparatus as defined in claim 2, in which the movable nozzle comprises. a rotatable mem-'- her having a long slot therein, through which a blast of air may be deliveredagainstthe print material on the printed object.

4. An apparatus asdefined in claim 2, in which the movable nozzle comprises a movable member having a slot therein through which a blast of air a may be delivered against the printed'object, and the apparatus further comprises stencil associated with said movable member, so that when the latter is'moved, the stencil will prevent the air from being delivered against predetermined areason said object; v n 5. The method of surface decoration which I comprises depositing liquid coloring materials upongadjacent' areas of a surface. to form a' definite pattern and,while maintaining the approximate form of said pattern, blowing said coloring materials with an air blast" so as to cause lateral flow thereof.

6. The method as defined in claim 5, in which I the coloring material is applied in spaced drops from a sawed printing block, and the drops are made to flow laterally and coalesce into a continuous film by the blowing step. v I 7. The method as defined in claim 5, in which the coloring material is applied in a layer of 1353 sufficient thickness to permit it to flow out for a substantial distancefrom the area to which it is originallyapplied, andthe blowing is directed againstthe coloringmaterialat the borders of the pattern areas until it has been forced to interfiow appreciably across said borders with the coloring material on adjacent pattern areas. w

, r JAMES W. KEMMLER.

. WILLIAM C. WEIGLE. 

